Burn
by xmaggalinex
Summary: one day on the boat goes horribly wrong. they will never be the same again.
1. Chapter 1

**Tory:**

Looking back at it, the day started normal enough. Had I know what was going to happen that day, I may have just stayed in bed all day and did my homework like I should have. But I didn't, so everything that happened could be my own fault…

That morning I stepped onto the dock as Ben roared _Hugo's_ engine. I smiled as a breeze picked up my corkscrew red curls and the smell of the ocean's breeze filled me and lifted my spirits even more. There was a festival going on in Charleston today and the boys and I had nothing better to do so we decided to head out there. "Morning Captain!" I said saluting him, laughing.

"Morning sailor," Ben replied, smirking. Ben held a hand out for me, I took it graciously jumped into the boat. I being who I am, tripped and fell of course into Ben's arms. "Have a nice trip?" Ben laughed quietly in my ear. Though he laughed, he was unbelievable tense, I felt his muscles underneath his shirt against my back and I immediately felt my face flush.

"Yeah, well, I guess I'll see you next fall," I said righting myself.

"That's original." Ben snickered, picking up a pile of rope.

Well, neither was yours so were even," I said sitting down in shotgun seat.

"Touché" a smile hinted at his lips again. Damn he was in a good mood. "where are the other two duffaces?"

"Not sure, I text them," I said kicking my feet onto the side of the boat.

"No need! I'm here!" I heard Hi call from the end of the dock in his usual Hawaiian shirts and odd colored shorts. Ben sighed, rolling his eyes. Hi jumped in and Shelton trailed behind of him, looking exhausted in basketball shorts and a purple shirt.

"Shut up and sit down, we need to go," Ben hissed, as he sat at the helm. He pulled a pair of shades of his cargo shorts shoved them on and threw the boat in reverse.

We glided over the water. I loved riding in the boat. The sun high in the air, not even a cloud in the sky. The day was completely beautiful.

And that's when everything went wrong.

As I admired the beautiful day, I smelled something burning, thinking it was just in my head I completely ignored it. But I continued to smell it, I turned to Ben. "Ben what is that smell?" I asked slightly confused.

He turned around and his copper colored skin paled completely. I twisted around, and then all hell broke loose. "FIRE!" ben screamed. I dashed back and grabbed the bucket that sat in the corner close to the outboard motor as flames shot out of it. I nearly fell out of the boat as I scooped water out of the ocean, but Shelton grabbed my shirt. But as soon as my feet hit the floor, my ears popped and my eyesight went black.

When I came around I was floating in red water.


	2. Chapter 2

Ben:

How had I not seen it? Or, for that matter, smelled it?

That didn't matter now. Hugo was destroyed. My old man was going to kill me. The one day he tells me to drive it so he could fix _Sewee_…

How had I not see?

I broke the waterline spitting, sputtering and cursing. My forehead, arms and chest burned like salt a wound. As to be expected, being blown up and all. I smelled the burning oil in the water but I heard no voices. "Hey? Everyone alright?" I called out. No one answered. "Hi!" I yelled. "Shelton?" I called. "Tory!" I screamed, remembering her being the closest to the burning outboard. I started to twist around in the water, looking frantically for floating bodies.

I heard sputtering and a scoff. "Tory?" I yelled. I started to swim in the direction of the sputtering.

"Nah Man! It's me!" Hi said gasping for air.

"Are you hurt?" I said reaching him. Putting a hand on his head, looking him in the eye.

"No. I think I'm good." He said looking a bit scared. No jokes, all serious. Man he must have been terrified.

I heard another set of violent coughing to my right. "Shelton ?"

"Yeah, I'm over here!" I swam from Hi to him.

A nasty cut was smeared across his face, but otherwise he looked alright. "are you alright?"

"Yeah." He chuckled. "Not dead yet." As he said it a scream of pain and terror erupted through the air. The scream was blood-curating and soul shattering. "Tory!" I yelled, but her scream just covered it all up. The screams turned to drowning cries of pain. My stomach flipped and my heart beat faster than it already was.

"Dude! She's over here!" Hi was already in motion, Shelton trailing behind. Stroking fast, I reached her before the two others. She continued to scream but tears rolled her face. "Tory?" I asked, "Hey calm down! What's wrong?" She let another sob loose but as she did one word became audible. Leg.

"Hey, you're going to be alright," I said trying to sooth her aching sobs. I grabbed her and started pulling toward shore which wasn't far but far enough to make me weak. Luckily we had blown near the marina and I only had to carry her about 300 feet to the marina check in building. I had sent Hi and Shelton ahead as they yelled call 911. Tory continued to sob uncontrollably, looking at her leg, I understood why. A massive third degree burn ran down the length her he thigh. I could still smell the burning flesh.

I reached the marina; I was met by three people carrying first aid kits. They threw a towel down and I laid her down, they rapped her thigh in fresh gauze and put a reflective solar blanket over the top of her body and head to keep her from going into shock. She continued to cry in pain while I held her head in my lap.

Her cries shook me. She never cried like this. She was never like this. She was normally strong with a really strong pain tolerance. She must have been in some serious pain to be crying this. Obviously. Her tears made me slightly angry at myself. I should have been the one in her place.

"Where are my other friends?" I asked the two men and the third women who sat on other sides of her.

"There being treated by the other women in the building. Let me look at that cut on your arm, its nasty." The women said reaching for my arm.

I jerked away. "No! Not until the ambulance takes care of her first!" I just put a hand on her forehead. For the first time she opened her eyes, pain was set deep in her deep green eyes.

Soon in the distance I heard sirens coming toward us and in blink the paramedics were pulling me away from her as her sobs of pain continued. The women paramedic pulled me away to look at my arm which was a lot worse than I had originally thought. It was deep and long, I must have been hit by shrapnel.

I hadn't really noticed until she poured iodine into the gash. Then all the pain came rushing in all at once.

Another ambulance arrived and walked out with Shelton and Hiram in tow. The put them in the back as the cops arrived to assess the scene. As they loaded Tory on the gurney into the ambulance, Bob, the manager of the marina ran out to tell me that he had called my father.

Great.

The para medics had given Tory a pain killer so she finally had stopped screaming but she was still crying. She stayed quiet in the ambulance as the ambulance sped us to the hospital. As soon as we arrived they took Tory in a different direction and the next three hours went by in a blur.

When they finally released me and the other numb-skulls, I started looking for Tory and her room but I couldn't find her anywhere. We finally found a lead but as we were about to enter a cop stopped us.

"Benjamin Blue?" The cop asked.

"Yeah," I grumbled. "I need to get in there, what do you need?"

"We need your statement." He said uncomfortably. I gave him my story but he didn't seem satisfied. "Did the boat have any extra equipment that didn't seem right to you that you noticed?"

I paused thinking the question was odd, "No…Why?" I said crossing my arms and furrowing my eyebrows, confused.

"We found explosives material on the boats motor, it seemed to be connected to the ignition and the outboard." The cop shifted. "The boat was rigged to blow."


	3. Chapter 3

**Tory:**

Pain.

That's all I really felt. I didn't feel much else.

I hadn't felt myself hit the water, I don't remember being pulled out, I don't remember being carried by Ben, I don't remember the marina, I don't even remember the ambulance I just remember the feeling of being thrown and the searing pain in my thigh and then I hit salt water.

And even more pain.

But when I woke up some of the pain had subsided, but I still felt a faint pain. My head felt woozy and I felt like I was moving in slow motion through Jell-O. there were a couple of things but were colored funny but otherwise I felt alright.

I sat up, rubbing my eyes. "Oh Tory. Your wake," I heard my father's voice to my right. "I was starting to worry."

"Where am I?" I croaked. My throat felt like sandpaper rubbing together, and it sounded like it too.

"Mt. Pleasant Hospital. How are you feeling?" he leaned forward.

"Alright, although I don't think that stuffed duck is suppose to be puke green…" I said laughing pointing to the stacks of stuff on the table at the foot of the bed.

"You don't like it?" Kit sounded sad. He picked up the oddly colored duck.

"Kit I think he's adorable, the color makes him unique," I laughed.

"Well I thought he was an odd color too," he said placing the on my shin, laughing.

There was a knock at the door and a man in a lab coat. "Ah, You're awake Tory. I'm Dr. Harold," the man stuck out his hand and I took it. "how are you feeling?"

"Good, I guess,"

"You have suffered so severe damage, my dear, but you're in relatively good condition and you will recover," he said looking at my charts. "But you will have major scar tissue. So you have an option that your father wanted you to decide for yourself."

I looked at Kit, "It was too big for me to decide." He shrugged.

"Then what is it? On with it!" I said

"You can either leave the scar tissue or you can have a skin graphed, where-"

"I know what a skin graph is." I stopped him. "I don't know sir. Ill let you know?" as I said it another more angry knock came at the door. Kit stood up and opened the door. Ben looked furious while Shelton and Hi looked scared. They had huge cuts, scratches and bruises all over their arms, legs and faces. "Tory, you're awake!" The boys' faces lit up, Ben's anger was lost for a moment, relief washed over his face.

"Tory, I'm going to go to the food court while you four catch up, would you like anything?" Kit said. Suddenly I had a pang of hunger.

"Anything, especially pudding!" I said. Kit laughed and the Doctor filed out of the room.

I turned back to the boys as the door shut quietly. Ben took the spot my father had vacated. His head fell to his hands and he sighed. Shelton stood at the foot of my bed and Hi took a spot by the window. "What happened?" I asked them. Hi and Shelton looked at their feet.

"Hugo was rigged to blow," Ben said plainly.

Shock rushed threw me, my leg burned with pain but I grit my teeth. "Excuse me? What do you mean it was rigged?" I shifted and my leg burned again but this time I grabbed at it. Suddenly the boys moved closer, but I waved them off. "Explain, please."

"When they released me, a cop stopped me and told me that they found explosive residue and a detonator. They asked me if I had any enemies," I giggled at that, "yeah we did the same thing. But I said no, at least not anyone that would want to blow us up. He asked if we had seen anyone unsual around the island lately and I said no and then he said he would let us know on the developments,"

"That's it?" I said raising an eyebrow. "That's all they gave us?"

"Yup," Hi pursed his lips.

"It was odd. Like he knew something that he wasn't telling us." Hi said picking up a box of candy and examined it. Then he cracked it open.

"Well, know we know how our parents feel," Shelton laughed. I scoffed. I guess he was right.

"You know something doesn't add up." I said rubbing my eyes in frustration. If someone was trying to get at us, why would they rig _Hugo_ Ben's dad's boat and not _Sewee_ Ben's personal boat. Then it dawned on me. "They weren't going after us, they were going after Tom," I muttered to myself.

"Tom?" Shelton asked.

"They were going after my dad," Ben said shocked.


	4. Chapter 4

**Hi!**

**I want to say thank you to all of you that have it may be a little bit before I can update again so I hope you enjoy this! Thank you again :)**

**Signed,**

**xmaggalinex 3**

**Hiram:**

You know my mother has the worst timing.

Just as things were getting interesting, she opened the door without knocking. "Hiram, Its time to go," she seemed pissed "Shelton you too, your mother asked to bring you with us. Oh Tory, your finally away! How are you feeling?"

She cleared her throat, "I'm okay, a little bit of pain but otherwise alright," she smiled. You know Tory was one of those people that could hide anything with just a smile and she always got away with it. If I even tried that I would get yelled at for "Snark and backsass", yeah that's my mother.

"Mom, just give us 5 more minutes? Please?" I begged.

"You have been here for two days, you need a shower and some sleep," she shook her head. Crap. There was no arguing now.

I sighed. "Fine," I picked up my ruined coat and running a hand through my hair.

"Wait, two days?" tory asked quietly.

"Yeah, you were out for a long time Tor. The accident was yesterday," Ben said leaning closer to her, his hand was inches from hers.

"geez," she rubbed her eyes . "Alright, Hi and Shelton go ahead, I'll be fine.

"Uh, well. I guess I'll see you later Tor." Shelton said as he put a hand on her foot.

"Yeah, go get some sleep," she smiled, which was encouragement enough.

"Ben you coming?" I asked, following mom out the door.

"Nah, I'm gunna stay," he leaned back in the chair.

"See yah man," I waved. As we walked down the hallway, I spotted the cop that had stopped us originally to ask us the question we had told tory about, was sipping coffee. I elbowed Shelton in the ribs wordlessly and nodded toward the cop. Shelton sighed but followed me. "Why can't you just listen to your mother?"

"Mother won't hurt me," I said as we both sat down next to the cop who was reading a file in his lap. "Hello Officer!" I threw a smile at him. "How are you doing today?"

"You two again? I thought I was done with you?" he sighed.

"We have a question! That's all and then we will get out of your hair," Shelton said crossing his arm over his chest.

"What do you want?" the cop sighed again.

"What was the bomb made of?" I asked. The cop scoffed. "Look man, we were blown up, I think we have a right to know what did it."

The cop scoffed, "look I can't release evidence,"

"No but you can go get another cup of coffee, on me by the way, and accidently leave the file here," I said quietly.

"Are you bribing a cop?" he asked.

I thought for a moment. "Yes." I flashed another smile

The cop rubbed his eyes took the cash from my hand and dropped the file on the floor then strolled down the hallway and disappeared. I looked at Shelton, "Well that was easier than I thought." I picked up the file and flipped through it. "It looks like it was just a homemade bomb."

"Well then how come it caused such a big reaction, there's no way that explosion could have cause that kind of… damage," Shelton said, he peered over my shoulder.

"I wasn't finished. It was twice the size then normal but because it was set so close to the gas tank it was larger then it was expected to be. But did the attacker plan it that way?" I taped my chin with my finger.

"I have a better question. Who would want to attack Tom?" Shelton said. He pulled the file from my hands, "Here, Tom's Background. Holy crap!"

"What? What is it?" Shelton still started at the papers in his hand. "Dude?"

"Did you know that Tom is Ex-Navy Seal?" Shelton asked me wide eye.

"No! holy crap! That makes him so much cooler," I said standing up. "But the next question is... does Ben know?"

We ran back to Tory's room. "Hey what did your father do before he moved to Morris Island ?

"I have no Idea," Ben sounded pissed.

"so you had no idea that he was a navy seal?" I asked, eyebrow raised.

"Crap, see this was what I was talking about Tor," he pointed to us.

"I'm hurt Benjamin!" I said dramatically.

"Shut up and listen! Yes, I knew. But that was a while ago, my dad got out just with honorable discharge. He has no enemies, so it's a dead end."

"Where's your Dad now?" Shelton asked, next to me.

"Down in the cafeteria with Kit and your mom," he said crossing his arm, and furrowing his eyebrows. "Why?"

"Come on, Bro. we got some questions for your dad." I said opening the door.

"wait what about me?" Tory asked Throwing her covers off. "I want to come!" she made a move to get up, while wincing. Ben pushed her burned, cut and scared legs back into the sheets.

"I don't think so. You are staying here." Ben said shaking his head.

"do you really want to do this?" she said pouting.

Needless to say five minutes later Ben was pushing her down the hall in a wheelchair. She had a very triumphant look on her face and a very pissed aura was coming from Ben.

As we reached the elevator I ran a head, "I'm going to hit the button." When we hit main floor I led everyone to the cafeteria but when I did I wished that I could have turned right around and just go home.

There where all of our parents were, a cop was cuffing Tom and leading him out of the double doors just past us. As soon as Ben saw he took off toward the cop "Ben!" Tory yelled. I followed him and pulled him back.

"What are you doing?" Ben snarled.

"Your father is a suspect in the explosion, son. You need to back off." The cop said pushing Ben back, I grabbed Ben's arms and held him back.

"He wouldn't blow up his own kid! Are you crazy?" Ben spat.

"He had access to the chemicals use in the explosive, he had the time, he had the opportunity and he had the motive," the cop said, gently.

"What motive?" The sting in his voice was like poison.

"The Gamemaster incident," the cop said. And then Ben turned white and cold.


	5. Chapter 5

**Tory:**

I stood on the beach, a suitcase sat sadly next to me. I remembered this, but from where? How did I get here? The wind picked up my hair as I looked out to the ocean. Something shifted in my fist, the picture of my mom and I.

With a pang in my chest, I relieved this was the day I moved to Morris. 2 days after my Mom's death. I tried to pull myself to reality, this wasn't happening again. I couldn't go through it again. Alone. Not knowing how to deal with it. My head started reeling. I was losing myself. Everything began to change colors, and I began to panic. The world around looked like a kaleidoscope, and images of my mother swam before my eyes, the vision of the man that gamemaster killed, the gamemaster himself, Kathleen Henton's skeleton, and the skeleton of the man we found as we looked for buried treasure. They burned into my head and I screamed. a burning pain seared through my body and collapsed into the purple sand as it changed to crimson, trying to rub my eyes, trying to wipe away the images that continued to flash in my head. I screamed again as the image of my mother, crumped in our wrecked heap of a car.

"Tory!" someone yelled my name. I sat up in my bed, covered in sweat, and my voice hoarse. Ben sat on the edge of my bed and holding me by the shoulders. "Hey!"

I breathed hard, remembering my nightmare, and remembering that it was just that. A nightmare. None of that had actually happened. "I'm okay," I said closing my eyes and breathed. "It was just a nightmare," I sighed, "it was just a nightmare."

"About what?" Shelton asked.

"Nothing, it doesn't matter," I shook head, which released a bout of nausea, that I thought I might actually hurl. "Just a nightmare, just a dream,"

The boys tossed each other a look but they dropped the topic like it was hot. I rolled my head over and looked at the clock. 3:00 p.m. we had lost three hours of precious time to free Tom. "Wait, what happened?" I asked shifting up but I failed as I twisted my leg wrong.

"Alright," Ben said standing up, he lifted me effortlessly into sitting position. "You need to pick a position and stick with it,"

"Why?" I crossed me arms over my chest.

"Because we're all not super macho like Ben!" Hi said as he tried to flex his biceps.

"So what happened?" I asked as I let laughter died down.

"Well after they took Tom in handcuffs you tried to help us wrangle Ben, but you took one step and fell to the floor and blacked out. Then you came round a little bit later but they gave you a dose of morphine and you slept for another two hours." Hiarm said. "Then we had to settle Ben down from his flare, which was terrifying because of where we are."

"Of course," I said, "so have you found anything else out?"

"Well, that cop never came back for the file so we snuck into the copy room and made copies of the file and returned the original," Hi smirked producing the manila folder from behind his back. He handed it to me and I flipped it open. "Can you believe our stroke of luck?" he laughed.

"Well our luck will run out, we can't have the most updated information," I said.

"way to bring down my high, Tor," Hi sighed dramatically.

"So, did you find anything interesting?" I said opening the file, "By the way, have you heard anything about your dad?' Ben's face darkened, but I had to know. It may give me an idea where the cops are.

"No, he called Dr. Howard to give him the info to post his bail," Ben grumbled.

I nodded, I flipped through the file but nothing seemed to pop out at me yet, hopefully something did soon. Because Ben looked like he was going to explode. I reached out and placed my hand on his, "We'll clear his name," I said. "we all know that he didn't do this."

At that moment Shelton's phone rang obnoxiously. He answered it and talked quietly into it, when he shut it he sighed. "Hi and I have to go and Tempe is here to see you Tor," I nodded and slipped the file under my pillow. "Ben is staying with you and your Dad," Shelton said to his feet, "or Tom said you could call your mom, it was up to you,"

"I'll stay," ben shifted.

"alright we'll see you in the morning," Shelton said as he shut the door behind him.

Ben sighed. "What are we gunna do?" he looked me in the eye, and I lost my train of thought.

"Umm well, I thought, uhh-" I tried to speak, but just then the door opened and I was pulled out of his eyes and brought back to reality of Aunt Tempe walking into the room.

A couple of hours later, Kit and Aunt Tempe left to go to the hotel down the street, they had offered Ben a room but he thought someone should stay with me so he sat back in the recliner in the corner of the room. I pulled the file form underneath me, and flipped it open again. I looked at Ben in the corner, worry and stress were set in deep creases in his face. "Ben," I watched him as he rolled his head to look at me. "I don't need you to get mad at me for this but I have to ask." Anger filled his eyes, "stop, just listen and be objective. Do you think your dad would do this?"

"No! even if he did, I don't know what the Gamemaster had to do with it," Ben dropped his head into his hands. I threw the covers off of me and kicked my feet off the bed. The recliner is less than five feet. I could do five feet. "This is all my fault," ben rubbed his eyes.

I placed my feet on cold tiled floor, and shifted all my weight to my right leg setting myself for hopping across the room. I hopped across the room but ever landing sent pain through my leg. I was halfway through when Ben looked up at me, shock rolled through his eyes and he jumped up and reached out for me. "What are you think you're doing?" He said, sweeping me up off my feet and walking me back to my bed.

"I don't want to be in bed anymore," I wined as I let me head fall back. I groaned.

"Well, you can't walk so you're not getting up," Ben said, placing me in the uncomfortable bed.

I groaned again. "here," Ben handed me the file. " lets go through the file and see if we can find anything." He pulled half of the file out and handed it to me. He pulled the chair up to the bed and he flipped through his file.

"There's nothing here," Ben sighed an hour later. "at least anything that I didn't already know." He rubbed his eyes and looked at his watch.

At that moment I picked up a piece of paper that was dated the day of the hurricane. I skimmed through the paper, it was Tom's statement on his son's involvement. It said a lot of things that would come off as motive, but it wasn't. But the cops were shoty around here, so they would take what they could get. "Ben you might want to see this but you also may not," I said keep the paper close to me.

"then I don't want to see it, just give me the highlights," he said, he placed his fore head on my shin.

"well it looks like motive but its sketchy, and wouldn't hold up in court for a second," I sighed, "so they won't hold it for long. The thing that's getting me is that we know it wasn't him, so we can assume it was meant for Tom himself." I sighed, Ben nodded. "so who would be after him or angrier enough to try and blow him up? Or even better! Who would but the bomb at the back of the boat when the captain is at the bow? so that gives us a detail that the cops don't have! they aren't very good at what they do!" I said coming to a realization.

"Because he didn't want to kill him?" Ben mumbled.

In that moment a nurse came in to change my iv bag and see if I need anything for the night. Minutes later she strided out.

"So who has he pissed off?" Ben asked. I saw the exhaustion in his face, his emotions had been running high all day and it was taking its toll. His eyes were barley open and every inch of him radiated exhaustion.

"Alright, I think that's enough for today," I pulled the papers from under him and put them back in the file.

"No! We have to keep going," he said reaching for the folder.

"And it won't help that your completely drained, so you're done for today." He reached over me but I stretched farther laughing. "I'm cutting you off!" I laughed as he smiled. His face lit up and he looked charming than usual, although he always looked good.

He finally gave up and sat back down; he looked at his watch again. "Fine, but I'm going to grab a snack before the cafeteria closes, what anything?" he asked.

"No, unless you want to get me some pudding, dad never brought me any," I laughed as he got up.

"Sure, vanilla? Right?" he asked opening the door.

"How'd you know?" I laughed.

Soon Ben stepped back through the door, holding two cups of pudding and something behind his back. "What's that?" I said looking behind him, he side stepped my gaze and smirked.

"Here," he handed me a pudding and a spoon. "I didn't get a chance to get you flowers, so I got you this," he pulled his hand from behind his back, producing a white owl pillow pet.

"Ben! Aww he's cute!" I laughed taking it from him.

"You like it? It's kind of nerdy I know but I thought it was cool, I don't know." He shrugged, his face started to turn red.

"No! He's adorable," I hugged the owl to my chest.

"Look tory the whole gamemaster thing… I just wanted to say I'm sorry again. And I know you're not… interested," he played with his hands in his lap.

I felt a sudden pang of guilt. This whole mess was because of me. Ben had admitted that he liked me about a month ago, for a while I couldn't talk to him, look at him or even touch him casually. But one day I missed him too much and knocked on his door. We didn't talk about the gamemaster, but we talked about everything else. "Hey," I leaned toward him, trying to catch his eye. "I never said I was not interested at all. I am just saying that my life, our life, is a mess. Between this whole thing," as I pointed to my eyes, talking about my flares, "and my life in general is a mess so, what I'm saying is that I can't handle it know. I have too much to sort out," I said looking at him even though he wasn't looking at me. I tried to get his eyes again. "hey, look at me, please?" he looked up. "What I'm saying that I am interested but just…not now."

He looked at me. "Do you get what I'm saying?" I asked.

"Yeah," a tiny smile hinted in his eyes.

"No hard feelings?" I smiled.

"No," he shook his head. "So what do you want to watch?"

"I don't know but this bed is big and cold and I miss my bed." I sighed.

"I can fix that," he smirked and I shifted over as he hoped next to me. he put an arm around me and he opened the pudding in my hand.

"Thank you," I smiled up at him, his eyes held mine for a moment and I lost my train of thought, but I pulled my eyes from his and I laid my head against his chest. And we sat and ate our pudding in comfortable silence until we both fell asleep.

**Hi!**

**thank you guys for being so patient! i wanted to say that i know this one was not as suspenseful as the past but i thought a little fluff was needed. ;) (cause i love ben and tory so much(or Ten))it will be back to normal soon. thank you again so much for the lovely responses! **

**Love you all!**

**signed**

**xmaggalinex **


	6. Chapter 6

Hi everyone!

thank you for being so patient! my last couple of weeks have had me running between different things and not being home for no longer then 6 hours a night. so thank you all for being so great and waiting! I hope to update again soon :)

thank you so muchh

signed,

xmaggalinex

Shelton:

The ride home was silent. No one talked and Hi fell asleep on the window as the air conditioner blasted. I tried to clear my head, but it was filled with the info that kept buzzing. Something didn't make sense but I couldn't figure out what it was.

As we pulled onto the street our homes sat, the car was filled with red and blue light. I peered outside the window, black SUVs and cop cars surrounded Ben's apartment.

"What is going on?" my mom said shocked.

"Holy crap! Hi!" I slapped Hiram awake and bailed out of the car. I ran back toward Ben's unit, men in black suits and black sunglasses bard our way. "What's going on?"

"Nothing that you need to worry about, kid," the man said. "Go home."

"no that house is my best friends house," I said angrily. "Do you even have a warrant? Because if you don't that's illegal search and seizure."

"smart kid." The man smirked.

"yeah top of my class," I said uneasily.

"Maybe you can understand this," he handed a sheet of paper that was a warrant saying that they had access to the whole unit and to clear the place of suspicious material that would give away his mission.

"What job is he working on? He is a ferry driver." I asked as Hi walked up behind me reading the sheet in my hand.

"That is a need to know," the man said.

"well we need to know" Hi said.

"No, I'm sorry kids." The man turned and stalked away.

"we gotta figure out what they're looking for," Hi said. "Hey use your ears!" he whispered.

" what are you talking about?" I asked confused.

Hi pointed to my eyes. "You need to flare" he whispered.

"I can't" I started to shake, fear welling up. Flaring for me was not my favorite thing to do, it wasn't comfortable at all.

"this is to clear Tom's name! do it for him," Hi said pushing me.

I sighed and pulled myself together and felt the flare coming.

SNAP.

Everything burst into clarity and my hearing exploded.

"Alright where is he?" I sighed, my heart racing.

"he's over there," Hi pointed and I zeroed in on his figured, I closed my eyes and listened for his voice.

"…we need to clear his mission information before the cops come…" he said.

"Well what are we looking for?" his buddy said.

"Anything that remotely relates to the mission on which his is working, anything that has to do with the Lab Base on Loggerhead," the agent said. Shock rocked my body. What is he talking about? "Anything that has to do with the private chemical research that he was investigating,"

"Holy crap Hi!" I hissed. Private chemical research? I thought Tom was an ex-navy seal? What else is he? I pulled my vision and looked at the leather wallet that he was flipping in his hand. That badge read CIA.

"What the hell is Tom up to?" I hissed to Hiram.


End file.
